DDD Factory Responsibility

Question

If have the following Code.

public class CountryFactory : IEntityFactory
{
    private readonly IRepository<Country> countryRepository;

    public CountryFactory(IRepository<Country> countryRepository)
    {
        this.countryRepository = countryRepository;
    }

    public Country CreateCountry(string name)
    {
        if (countryRepository.FindAll().Any(c => c.Name == name))
        {
            throw new ArgumentException("There is already a country with that name!");
        }

        return new Country(name);
    }
}

From a DDD approach, is the the correct way to create a Country. Or is it better to have a CountryService which checks whether or not a country exists, then if it does not, just call the factory to return a new entity. This will then mean that the service will be responsible of persisting the Entity rather than the Factory.

I'm a bit confused as to where the responsibility should lay. Especially if more complex entities needs to be created which is not as simple as creating a country.

Answer 1

In DDD factories are used to encapsulate complex objects and aggregates creation. Usually, factories are not implemented as separate classes but rather static methods on the aggregate root class that returns the new aggregate.

Factory methods are better suited than constructors since you might need to have technical constructors for serialization purposes and var x = new Country(name) has very little meaning inside your Ubiquitous Language. What does it mean? Why do you need a name when you create a country? Do you really create countries, how often new countries appear, do you even need to model this process? All these questions arise if you start thinking about your model and ubiquitous language besides tactical pattern.

Factories must return valid objects (i.e. aggregates), checking all invariants inside it, but not outside. Factory might receive services and repositories as parameters but this is also not very common. Normally, you have an application service or command handler that does some validations and then creates a new aggregate using the factory method and adds it to the repository.

There is also a good answer by Lev Gorodinski here Factory Pattern where should this live in DDD?

Besides, implementation of Factories is extensively described in Chapter 11 of the Red Book.